Nuggets head coach Michael Malone, right, talks with Jameer Nelson during a break in the Nuggets game against Indiana Pacers on Jan. 30. (AP Photo/Doug McSchooler)

Jameer Nelson is back in Philadelphia, spending time with his family and doing more than a little bit of thinking about his future with the Nuggets.

“We’ll see how things go,” he said. “We all have decisions to make.”

Nelson’s preference is to return to the Nuggets next season. Not only just return, but get back to playing a big role on the court. He’s got two years left on the three-year, $13.5 million deal he signed with the team last summer. But he played a total of just seven minutes in the Nuggets’ last 24 games of the season as D.J. Augustin took over the primary reserve point guard role. Nelson doesn’t want a repeat of that next season. Read more…

Steve Hess is one of a number of Nuggets staffers that received new, enhanced titles on Friday. He is now Director of Performance/Assistant Coach and Head Strength and Conditioning Coach (Photo by John Leyba/The Denver Post)

The Nuggets announced a number of staff adjustments on Friday, starting with a promotion of longtime scout Herb Livsey to Lead Scout.

Livsey has been with the Nuggets since the 2008-09 season, coming to the team from the Atlanta Hawks. He also worked for the Portland Trailblazers.

“You’d be hard-pressed to find someone more dedicated and knowledgeable about the game of basketball,” said Nuggets general manager Tim Connelly in a statement. “Herb is one of the most well respected scouts in all of basketball and our organization is very fortunate to continue to have him as a resource.” Read more…

Tim Connelly’s three seasons as Nuggets general manager have been anything but uneventful. There have already been two coaches, sizeable roster turnover and emotions that have been in a constant tug-of-war.

But now, he feels as good about the direction of his team as he has at any point in his tenure. Connelly’s talked about making a run at the playoffs next season. This is the remainder of a wide-ranging interview with The Denver Post about the state of the Nuggets, which includes his thoughts on the season, head coach Michael Malone, and rookies Emmanuel Mudiay and Nikola Jokic.

On if the season was a success: Given our record, a successful season is a postseason appearance. But I think relative to our expectation level with so many young guys, it’s been a huge success for our coaching staff instilling a culture and a the kind of approach we can build upon. I think we’ve seen young players grow immensely. I doesn’t feel good that we’re doing this interview at the end of our season, but when we reflect on it we see more good than bad.

All of the kudos go to Mo and the staff. We had to find out about a bunch of young players this year and that’s not easy in this league. And we found out about them by trial and error, their ability to play through mistakes. So, as we reflect back upon it, it’s a year of immense growth and growth that will serve us well going into this offseason. Read more…

With tiebreakers sorted out, the Nuggets now know exactly where their picks will be in this year’s draft, except for the the lottery selection, which will be swapped with the Knicks if it is more advantageous.

The Nuggets were in a three-way tie, record-wise, with Milwaukee and Sacramento. The tiebreaker resulted in the Kings getting the No. 8 slot, the Nuggets at No. 9 and the Bucks at No. 10. Percentage-wise, there is almost no difference in the three. They all carry varying degrees of a six percent chance to land a top three pick and a 1.9 or 1.8 percent chance to land the top pick.

The Knicks were locked into the No. 7 slot, which carries a 15 percent chance to land top three and a 4.3 percent chance to land the No. 1 overall pick.

The Nuggets also have two second round picks, No. 53 and No. 56 overall.

NUGGETS FIRST ROUND PICKS

1. Their own, which can be swapped with the Knicks: This is the last piece of the 2011 Carmelo Anthony trade. The Knicks have the seventh-worst record in the NBA, which carries a 15 percent chance of landing a top three pick. The Nuggets have a 6 percent chance of landing a top-three pick. So, in all, the Nuggets have two chances to land a top-three spot. They’ll take the better of the two picks after the draft lottery. Read more…

Ball-handling duties are only a dire need if you don’t have players who can handle the ball. This, by all accounts, is the Nuggets mantra just a few days after waiving point guard Erick Green in order to make room to fill an area of need, small forward, with Kostas Papanikolaou.

And yet it remains a relevant question because of the team’s recent history.

Two seasons ago, when the Nuggets encouraged Andre Miller to take an extended leave of absence after a spat with then-coach Brian Shaw, it culminated in his trade. Not having a third point guard while Miller was gone became a real issue when injuries to the other two — Ty Lawson and Nate Robinson — left the team with no point guards in a game, and with just one the majority of the time because Robinson was out for the season with a torn ACL. Randy Foye assumed a heavy load of ball handling responsibilities and the team eventually traded for Aaron Brooks to patch it up. Read more…

Coach Michael Malone was part of a Nuggets contingent that attended Broncos training camp Monday. (John Leyba, The Denver Post)

Coach Gary Kubiak might want to watch out. Scouts have their eyes on his backup quarterback.

Three days after Brock Osweiler’s impressive showing in Seattle — arguably his best showing as a pro — Nuggets coach Michael Malone, general manager Tim Connelly and other team assistants and staff members attended the Broncos’ training camp practice at Dove Valley.

And Osweiler, for obviously reasons, caught Malone’s eye.

“I mean he’s 6-foot-8,” Malone said of the former Arizona State quarterback who almost ended up at Gonzaga to play basketball. “I know that he played very well in the first game against Seattle and I hope he can really have a great season, but I heard he was a pretty good high school basketball player. If he wants to come over and help us out, he’s more than welcome to, and I promised coach Kubiak we’ll make sure he doesn’t get hurt.”

Denver Nuggets’ Emmanuel Mudiay, left, goes up for a shot against the Atlanta Hawks’ Walter Tavares during the first half of an NBA summer league basketball game Friday, July 10, 2015, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher)

So let’s just make it official: Rookie first round draft pick Emmanuel Mudiay is the starter at point guard.

Right?

“That’s up to coach Malone,” said Nuggets general manager Tim Connelly.

So…yes, then. We’ll just take it that way.

Malone handed Mudiay the keys to the summer league team without a second thought, and he’ll likely do the same when the regular season begins in the fall. But just how much is too much of workload for a 19-year old just getting his feet wet in the NBA? Read more…

"I was just talking to Ty earlier," Connelly said after the Nuggets' finale summer league game. "Ty's going through a rough time right now and we're all behind him. Ty's a really good person. He's a Nugget.

As the Denver Nuggets mulled their first-round decision on draft night Thursday, point guard Ty Lawson offered a few ideas of his own — while smoking a hookah.

A stream of Lawson and friends watching the draft and smoking was posted on Twitter Thursday evening. In the clip, Lawson tells a friend before the Nuggets’ first-round selection of Emmanuel Mudiay: “They’re probably gonna get Mudiay, then I’m gonna get a bunch of tweets about, ‘Yo, Ty, you’re getting traded.'”

Earlier in the clip, Lawson commented on Willie Cauley-Stein, the center out of Kentucky who was selected by the Sacramento Kings.

“Cauley-Stein getting drafted might mean Cousins is gone,” Lawson said of Kings big man DeMarcus Cousins. Lawson then sat back a inhaled the hookah as he awaited the Nuggets’ selection. He turned to the camera and said, “Tim Connelly, it was good.”

Later in the video, Lawson commented on the Nuggets’ 30-52 season, responding to a friend who claimed the Nuggets “suck.”

The draft is upon us, which means the endless rumors finally come to an end and actual moves can start to be made. The Nuggets, with many players who are coveted around the league, are as pivotal a team in this year’s draft as there is.

Trades they make, particularly any big ones, can reshape the direction of the draft.

What I know going into Thursday’s NBA draft is there is a ton of information floating around about what the Nuggets plan to do. With apologies to the great Peter King, Sports Illustrated and Monday Morning Quarterback columnist, here are five things I think going into Thursday’s NBA draft. Read more…

“Making a decision like this is never easy and is never done hastily, especially when you are dealing with a person of Monty Williams’ character. We thanked Monty for the tremendous work and commitment he made to our organization and the development of our young players, specifically Anthony Davis,” said Pelicans executive vice president Mickey Loomis.

Current Nuggets general manager Tim Connelly has ties to Williams. Read more…

They are approaching their first trade deadline in a sole “sellers” mindset for the first time in many years. In return they hope to collect more picks — preferably in the first round — and perhaps a player or two they can go forward with as they begin an eight-month retool of a current roster that has fallen well short of preseason expectations.

Now that the NBA is clear of the all-star break, a business “dead period,” deals league-wide will commence. And it got started quickly with Knicks forward Amar’e Stoudemire agreeing to a buyout late Sunday night. Expect the Nuggets name to be attached to numerous trade scenarios. They have a number of players that may or may not be with them in uniform by the time the open the post-all-star portion of the season Friday night at Milwaukee.

Arron Afflalo and Wilson Chandler. Afflalo has risen to the top as the most coveted Nuggets players heading into the deadline. And for a few reasons. First, he’s a solid scorer from the shooting guard spot. He’s second on the team with 14.5 points per game on 42 percent shooting and 33.7 percent from beyond the arc, he can score in a variety of ways and he remains a capable defensive player. However, Chandler’s numbers are almost identical. He’s averaging 13.9 points per game on 42 percent shooting and 33.8 percent from 3-point range. Outside of Chandler’s rebounding advantage — he’s averaging 6.0 per game to Afflalo’s 3.6 — the difference between the two is primarily in their contracts.

We don’t know what Nuggets general manager Tim Connelly and head coach Brian Shaw ultimately have in store in putting their stamp on reworking the Nuggets roster.

But we have clues.

Those clues came in the first few weeks after both were hired in 2014. Shaw talked about playing inside, out. He talked about playing smashmouth basketball. Yet those are things his teams have never been able to get to, in either year of his coaching tenure.

But that won’t be the case for long. The Nuggets will get to work on constructing a team that plays that way, because if Shaw is going to go down he’s going to go down playing the type of basketball he wants to play.

There’s not one surefire way to makeover a roster. In this case, using what little we know we’ve blended free agency and the draft in a way that checks off many of the boxes.

So, for entertainment purposes only, this is how the Nuggets can get from here — 20-33 at the All Star break — to something different, and better, in the future.

Nuggets guard Arron Afflalo clears out some room between himself and New York guard Pablo Prigioni during Sunday’s game. (Photo by Alex Goodlett/Getty Images)

NEW YORK – Three takeaways the morning after the Nuggets’ 109-93 loss to the Knicks at Madison Square Garden on Sunday.

1. Connelly staying calm. None of this is what anyone in the Nuggets organization, most of all general manager Tim Connelly, wanted. The Nuggets’ 2-7 start – with a game coming up in Cleveland looming – is exactly the opposite of what he’d envisioned the start for his rapidly-healing team might be. But it has underperformed. Still, at this point Connelly says he’s not pressing the panic button. “Certainly we’ve struggled,” he said after the game. “But it’s early.” Read more…

The Nuggets open the 2014-15 season Wednesday at home against the Pistons, and despite the bleak outlook many in and out of the NBA have for Denver this year, GM Tim Connelly has high hopes.

After a season in which they turned in one of their worst records ever (36-46), the Nuggets are, for the most part, finally healthy. They bring with him some new faces and depth that few teams can match.

Connelly who will be at Session Kitchen this evening as part of The Denver Post’s Nuggets Night, along with Christopher Dempsey and Benjamin Hochman (it’s not too late to buy tickets!), joined The Press Box Monday morning to weigh in on the season, and some players he has views as key pieces to the team’s success.

“The core of this team has won together, and they’ve done it before as presently constructed,” Connelly said. “Some of our peripheral guys are guys that we can count on, our depth makes us unique. And the second year under both (coach) Brian (Shaw) and myself, there’s a lot more continuity that often times helps with success. I’m optimistic by nature, but objectively, we have a bunch of guys that are good to very good NBA players who are playing with a chip on their shoulder.”

With the addition of 7-footer Jusuf Nurkic via the draft, the Nuggets are now stacked at the center position, where he’ll fight for minutes with veterans JaVale McGee and Timofey Mozgov.Read more…

JaVale McGee continues to fight with soreness from his left tibia (Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post)

Three of the Nuggets four “surgery” players are champing at the bit to get out on the court. Probably, all four are, actually. But only Danilo Gallinari, Nate Robinson and J.J. Hickson are close. JaVale McGee is having to play the patience game.

“What he’s going through right now is when he has practiced and he has done physical work out there on the floor, he’s the only one that’s shown some soreness the next day,” Nuggets coach Brian Shaw said. “But from our medical staff they say that’s pretty natural, he’s going to be sore and then he’ll take a day (off) and the soreness will go away and then he’ll do a little bit more the next time.”

Everything was a-ok on draft night and then again during a very productive U20 European Championship with Bosnia and Herzegovia from July 10-20. (Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images)

If you were a little leery about the Nuggets top draft pick, center Jusuf Nurkic, the 10 days from July 10-20 had to put a smile on your face and ease your mind about his potential.

Nurkic, this year’s 16th draft pick whose rights were traded from the Chicago Bulls to the Nuggets, played top shelf basketball for Bosnia and Herzegovina in the U20 European Championship Division B tournament.

His team won the title and the 6-11, 280-pound behemoth was named MVP with monster averages of 21.4 points, 12.0 rebounds, 3.3 assists, 2.6 blocks and 1.8 steals per game. By the end of the eight games, he was pretty much unstoppable, shooting 63 percent from the field in his last three. And the big man made 16-of-18 free throws in the title game against a team whose strategy was to foul him and let him shoot free throws instead of destroy them from the field. Read more…

Chris Dempsey arrived at The Denver Post in Dec. 2003 after seven years at the Boulder Daily Camera, where he primarily covered the University of Colorado football and men's basketball teams. A University of Colorado-Boulder alumnus, Dempsey covers the Nuggets and also chips in on college sports.